Friends of Martins Beach

A little-noticed decision by the California Supreme Court in a lawsuit involving Martins Beach could make life more difficult for the property owner, venture capitalist Vinod Khosla, in his long-running legal battle to keep the public off his coastal land.

And it delivers the latest repudiation to San Mateo County Superior Court Judge Gerald Buchwald, whose head-scratching 2014 ruling in the suit, brought by group of surfers calling themselves Friends of Martins Beach, now essentially has been wiped from the face of the Earth.

On July 20, the state high court ordered the depublication of an April ruling by the 1st District Court of Appeal in San Francisco in the Friends case, meaning the opinion will not appear in the appellate court’s official reports and may no longer be cited as precedent in other cases. The arcane judicial decree came without explanation. Continue Reading →